Press releases 2003

Volvo Trucks has appointed new managers for its operations in North and South America. As announced previously, Peter Karlsten, currently President of Volvo do Brasil, will become President of Volvo Trucks North America Inc. The new manager of Volvo Trucks’ South American operations, based in Curitiba, Brazil, will be Tommy Svensson.

Deliveries from Volvo's truck operations, which include Volvo Trucks, Mack and Renault Trucks, declined 18% in July, compared with the corresponding month in the preceding year. On a year-to- date basis, deliveries amounted to 86,090 trucks, which is 4% below the year-earlier period. In Europe, deliveries declined by 3%, while North America posted a 14% decline compared with the first seven months in 2002.

SCA hands over responsibility for the joint Group mainframe computers to Volvo IT in Göteborg.

Volvo and Wärtsilä are planning future cooperation regarding service and delivery of marine diesel engines for commercial shipping. The cooperation will be initiated in a number of selected markets, with global coverage planned thereafter.

The results are in and once again professional drivers named the new Volvo VN their overwhelming preference, rating it above every other make of tractor on the road in the U.S. and Canada. In fact, the Volvo VN was the runaway favorite during Volvo Truck's Drive The Future Tour, with 9 out of 10 drivers preferring the new VN over their current truck in each category surveyed. This follows the VN's top rating among drivers in the first Drive the Future Tour, held in Fall 2002.

Shareholders in Kommersiella Fordon Europa AB (KFAB) representing 97.6 percent of the capital and the votes in KFAB have accepted the offer from Volvo which, after extension, expired on 8 August 2003.

Michael Farley, President and CEO of Volvo Construction Equipment Rents, Inc. (Volvo Rents), has left the company.

The Norwegian magazine Skipsrevyen recently named the research vessel M/S G.O. Sars the Ship of the Year. The new ship, which was named after a famous Norwegian zoologist, is highly advanced, including such features as extreme silent operation, fully comparable in class to military submarines. The auxiliary engine and emergency genset onboard are from Volvo Penta.

The Volvo Group continued to improve its profitability for the fourth consecutive quarter compared with the corresponding periods in the preceding year. Earnings improved despite a drop in sales of ten percent related to the weakening US dollar. It is also encouraging to note that the Group generated a positive operating cash flow in the first half of the year. Synergies from the Truck operations contributed a great deal to the improvement, as did the new and highly successful product program of Volvo Trucks and the clearly improved profitability of Renault Trucks, says Leif Johansson, CEO.

Only a year into its relationship with Nationwide Crash Repair Centres, the largest Crash Repair Centre in Britain, Volvo Information Technology GB Ltd has been awarded a further £1.2M contract for the infrastructure and management of Nationwide's Wide Area Network (WAN).